1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention relate to battery packs that may be connected to battery mount portions of electric apparatus. The embodiments also relate to systems including battery packs and electric apparatuses to which the battery packs are connected.
2. Description of the Related Art
JP-A-2001-143678 discloses a battery pack 100 shown in FIGS. 13 and 14. The battery pack 100 is designed for use as a power source of an electric tool. As shown in FIG. 13, the battery pack 100 includes left and right slide rails 103 disposed at the upper surface of a housing 102 for connection with a battery mount portion 105 (see FIG. 14) of the electric tool. The slide rails 103 extend in a forward and rearward direction with respect to the battery pack 100. As shown in FIG. 14, each of the slide rails 103 includes a rail body 103m and a laterally projecting linear projection 103y protruding outward in a widthwise direction (leftward and rightward) by a given distance from the upper end of the rail body 103m. In this way, each of the slide rails 103 has a substantially inverted L-shape cross-section.
As shown in FIG. 14, the battery mount portion 105 of the electric tool has a pair of vertical walls 106 at opposite ends in the widthwise direction. A rectangular groove 106m is formed in the inner wall of each of the vertical walls 106 and extends in the forward and rearward direction for fitting with the corresponding slide rail 103 of the battery pack 100. Therefore, the battery pack 100 can be connected to the electric tool by initially fitting the laterally projecting linear projections 103y of the slide rails 103 of the battery pack 100 into the rectangular grooves 106m of the battery mount portion 105 of the electric tool. Afterwards, it can be accomplished by moving the electric tool and the battery pack 100 to slide relative to each other in the forward and rearward direction.
A plurality of different types of electric tools may have standardized battery mount portions each configured to be similar to the battery mount portion 105. Also a plurality of different types of battery packs may have standardized slide rails each configured to be similar to the slide rails 103. In this way, a specific battery pack (e.g., the battery pack 100) can be shared with a plurality of electric tools.
However, in the case that a plurality of different types of battery packs have standardized slide rails 103, even a small battery pack is necessary to have the slide rails 103 that are the same as those of a large battery pack.
The standardized slide rails 103 may be too large for a small battery pack, leading to difficulties in reducing the size of the battery packs.
Therefore, there has been a need in the art for enabling a small battery pack having a standardized connection section with a reduced size.